Once purchased, what is the condition of the average
slave? If he is put in a factory, he probably has to work long hours on
meager rations. He is lodged in a kind of kennel; his only respite is on
the great religious holidays. He cannot contract valid marriage or enjoy
any of the normal conditions of family life. Still his evil state is
partially tempered by the fact that he has to work in constant
association with free workmen, and he seems to be treated with a
moderate amount of consideration and good camaraderie. On the whole he
will have much less to complain of (if he is honest and industrious)
than his successors in Imperial Rome.

In the household, conditions are on the whole better.
Every Athenian citizen tries to have at least one slave, who, we
must grant, may be a starving drudge of all work. The average gentleman
perhaps counts ten to twenty as sufficient for his needs. We know of
households of fifty. There must usually be a steward, a butler in charge
of the storeroom or cellar, a marketing slave, a porter, a baker, a
cook,[6]
a nurse, perhaps several lady's maids, the indispensable attendant for
the master's walks (a graceful, well-favored boy, if possible), the
pedagogue for the children, and in really rich families, a groom, and a
mule boy. It is the business of the mistress to see that all these
creatures are kept busy and reasonably contented. If a slave is
reconciled to his lot, honest, cheerful, industrious, his condition is
not miserable. Athenian slaves are allowed a surprising amount of
liberty, so most visitors to the city complain. A slave may be flogged
most cruelly, but he cannot be put to death at the mere whim of his
master. He cannot enter the gymnasium, or the
public assembly; but he
can visit the temples. As a humble member of the family he has a small
part usually in the family sacrifices. But in any case he is subject to
one grievous hardship: when his testimony is required in court he must
be "put to the question" by torture. On the other hand, if his master
has wronged him intolerably, he can take sanctuary at the Temple of
Theseus, and claim the privilege of being sold to some new owner. A
slave, too, has still another grievance which may be no less galling
because it is sentimental. His name (given him arbitrarily perhaps by
his master) is of a peculiar category, which at once brands him as a
bondsman: Geta, Manes, Dromon, Sosias, Xanthias, Pyrrhias,—such names
would be repudiated as an insult by a citizen.